


we'll make it through

by iron_spider



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Gen, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Post A4 Speculation, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Precious Peter Parker, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 22:04:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15616014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iron_spider/pseuds/iron_spider
Summary: Tony watches as May taps her nails on the table. The sound seems to worm its way into his skull, deep into the crevices of his brain, filling up all the silence. Everything has felt silent since they got back home, and Peter closed the door behind him. Tony thought he felt helpless before, when there was ash in the air and fear in his heart. But now Peter’s back. Everybody’s back. They’re supposed to be celebrating, they’re supposed to be throwing parties and making bad lemon drop shots and playing that stupid dancing game Peter likes just because they can. They’re alive, they’re all alive against all odds, they made it—but Peter’s in bed. Peter’s quiet.Tony and May have no goddamn idea what to do about it.





	we'll make it through

Tony watches as May taps her nails on the table. The sound seems to worm its way into his skull, deep into the crevices of his brain, filling up all the silence. Everything has felt silent since they got back home, and Peter closed the door behind him. Tony thought he felt helpless before, when there was ash in the air and fear in his heart. But now Peter’s back. Everybody’s back. They’re supposed to be celebrating, they’re supposed to be throwing parties and making bad lemon drop shots and playing that stupid dancing game Peter likes just because they can. They’re alive, they’re all alive against all odds, they made it—but Peter’s in bed. Peter’s quiet.

Tony and May have no goddamn idea what to do about it. 

He hates having his arm in a sling, but he supposes it’s better than having no arm at all. He squeezes his fingers into a fist and feels the strain cutting through his nerves. He remembers Helen’s face when she first saw the damage. He’s glad he passed out right after, and woke up with things dealt with already. Now he’s just waiting for the pain to settle. Not go away, because pain usually clings to him, sinks down into his core and makes a home there. Duller, but still present. 

May keeps tapping her nails and then she covers one hand with the other, stopping herself. Silence.

“What do we do about this?” she asks. She starts picking at her nails now, starts chewing on them. It makes him want to do it too, but he clenches his free hand in his lap. “What should we do?”

It’s been two days. That’s all. In some ways it feels like an eternity, in others like a few, sharp moments, sharp enough to shatter, like Thanos can rise back up from the broken pieces they left him in and steal Peter all over again. 

“I’m…I’m not sure,” Tony says, clearing his throat. He feels too damn loud. But he knows it should be louder, because everyone is haunting these halls—he’s a goddamn bed and breakfast for the foreseeable future, every room occupied with an Avenger or a Guardian or some kind of combination, even Rhodey and Strange are staying here, even Happy and May herself. So it should be louder. The halls should be filled with Peter’s chattering, Thor’s booming declarations, Clint’s snipping and Natasha’s jabs. But all of them are quiet.

Tony clears his throat again. He meets May’s eyes. “I want to—I want to say it’s normal. Because, I mean, it is. There’s—there’s normalcy in this. Jesus, I mean—after everything first happened, when I got back, you know how we were—”

“Yeah,” May says. “I mean, I know how I was and I didn’t go through—anything like what you did—what happened to him—everybody else, I couldn’t, I was—I was lucky, I could never—”

“C’mon,” Tony says, shaking his head. “That’s your kid. That was—that was losing your kid. The worst kind of feeling.” He knows. He really knows.

May smiles sadly, and taps her nail twice on the table again, the few old chips of purple catching the light. There’s a plate of food between them—Tony’s sorry excuse for an appetizer or whatever the hell he was going for, crackers and cheese and grapes, grapes that he keeps smashing instead of eating, and he figures Pepper is gonna give him shit for wasting them when she gets in here to see what he’s doing. He keeps his hand in his lap so he doesn’t smash another one. 

“You know, I never thought I’d be co-parenting again, after losing Ben,” May says, looking up at him. “But here we are. And I’m glad.”

That sends a wash of warmth through Tony’s heart and he nods. “Pete’s the best.”

“He is.”

“He’ll be okay,” Tony says, half talking to her, half talking to himself. “It’ll just take time, for all of us. But honestly, May, you gotta take a nap, you’ve been saying it for hours and you’re not heading in that direction and if you don’t in the next ten seconds I’m gonna call the police.”

She snorts, shaking her head. “Oh, you’re gonna call the police?”

“The FBI. I’ll get Steve down here to talk sternly to you. You can have a stern-off.”

“I honestly don’t know who would win that,” she says. “He’s pretty good.”

“I’ll do it,” Tony says. “There are no empty threats with me.”

“What about you?” she asks. “How many hours did you get last night?”

Two. More like one and a half. Their victory was riddled with close calls and a lot of pain, and now Steve’s got a scar that matches Fury’s, red and wild-looking. When Tony lies in bed at night he can see all the moments they could have lost, again, all the moments they could have stepped the wrong way, said the wrong thing, and all the alternate realities haunt him. All the times they didn’t get their people back. All the times Peter continued to languish in that fucking pocket universe or whatever the hell. All the times Tony met his own end, and worse yet, didn’t and had to watch the others go. For good. He can feel the gravel beneath his feet still, can feel the suit failing, can feel that thing on his arm and the ragged agony when the power struck through him. He’s lucky he still has an arm. He tries to keep telling himself that.

So he doesn’t sleep. But he’s sure as hell not gonna tell her that.

“Six or so,” he says, trying to sound as truthful as possible. She gives him a look but he nods. “For real.”

“Uh huh,” she says. She flattens her hands on the table and gets to her feet. “You’ll check on him?”

“I am going to hover inside the doorway like the most annoying helicopter,” he says. 

“Now that I believe,” she says. She gives him a soft smile. “Come get me if you need me, and I’m serious, Tony.”

“I will,” he says. “Promise.”

She gives him another wary look and he gives her a thumbs up. She goes after that, seemingly placated, and when he’s alone he sighs, cracking his neck. “Fri?”

“ _Yes, boss_?”

“How’s Pete?”

“ _Vitals are good. He woke up twenty minutes ago, but he hasn’t gotten out of bed._ ”

It’s two in the afternoon, and Peter’s been sleeping on and off since Tony brought breakfast into his room earlier. He isn’t sure if the others are sleeping too, or just wanting to be alone. That’s the last goddamn thing Tony wants right now. He clicks his tongue, nodding to himself, and eases out of the chair. He feels every bit of the battle all over him, bruises littering every inch of his body, and his bones click and crack like he’s a hundred years old. He hates how his arm feels pinned to his side. He hates everything about his aches and pains right now.

He trudges towards Peter’s room anyway. When he gets to the door he knocks softly, putting his hand on the knob. “Peter?” he asks, and he waits for a moment but doesn’t get a reply. Peter hasn’t really been talking a whole lot, only when he absolutely has to, but he’s not locking the door. It reminds Tony of how he felt in the weeks after the Battle of New York, unable to push himself but desperate for someone to crack through the wall he’d built up around himself.

He clenches his bad hand again, feels that familiar sharp, sting of pain, and then he slowly opens the door.

Peter has had a room here since he rejected the initial Avengers offer. That’s when he started staying over, started working with Tony on anything and everything, started becoming one of the brightest constants in Tony’s life, right alongside Pepper, Happy and Rhodey. Tony put up posters in here, _Return of the Jedi_ and _Wrath of Khan_ and a bunch of science geek stuff that Peter beamed at when he first saw it. He put up one of those constellation borders like Peter was five instead of fifteen, but even now at seventeen he still looks at it like he loves it, and matches up the ones he can see through his window. He’s got a king sized bed, sheets with an asinine thread count, a full bookcase with books Tony had covertly gauged Peter’s interest in from Ned. He bought him a new Apple desktop, an iPad, and somewhere in there he realized he was probably going overboard, but the look of wonder in Peter’s eyes always made Tony just want to buy him more shit. He tried to finish with a very self-serving Iron Man iPad cover, and one of those pillows that changes material when he runs his fingers over it. Peter loved all of it. He loved his space here, and that filled Tony with a sense of pride he’d never quite felt before. 

The remains of Peter’s breakfast is on the bedside table, two pancakes remaining. Tony stands in the doorway and looks at Peter in the middle of all this shit, cuddled up in the bed with his back to him, facing the wall. Tony doesn’t know how to make it all enough, these material things, after what they’ve all been through. But he knows Peter needs more than that, more than a hand-braided area rug or a vintage nautical telescope. He needs people, he needs reassurances, he needs the world to make sense again. 

Tony cracks his jaw. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to do that, because he’s never been able to make sense of the world on his own. But this is Peter, and he needs the kid to be okay. Then he’ll work on the rest of them.

He walks into the room and he knows Peter can hear him because everything he does is loud in this new world, his breathing, his footfalls, the way his knee cracks every time he takes a step. He clears his throat again to add to the loud, and he sits on the edge of the bed. He runs his hand over the godforsaken sling, and he’s surprised to see Peter turn a little to look at him. Usually he avoids eye contact, grunts when spoken to, and only looks when threats are made. Tony feels a little like he’s been harassing him since they all got home, but now, he thinks he might have made some progress to get to this point. 

“You okay?” Tony asks, trying to read the kid’s expression. Peter’s quiet for half a millisecond, which sends Tony into a quest to continue to fill the silence. “May and I were having a meeting about you. A legitimate meeting, facing each other at the table. An appetizer was provided, by…myself, I think I did pretty good. I think I might be attending future parent-teacher conferences, May hinted at something and I figure, with our combined powers of intimidation we can get anything done. Even early graduation, I think we can swing it.”

Peter closes his eyes, and Tony earns a small smile from him.

“You need any food?” Tony asks, shifting a little closer to him, craning his neck. “Pancakes were—treacherously ignored, I feel…offended, on their behalf—”

“I’m okay,” Peter says. He still looks the same, but somehow there’s something else in his face now—not age, but experience. He hasn’t talked about what happened, where he was, where half the universe was, and they only know what they know about it from Sam and Quill, who couldn’t shut the hell up. Tony doesn’t want to think about it. Doesn’t want to think about that orange landscape they described. How they were alone, listless. How it felt like years. Decades. He doesn’t want to think about it. When he fucking thinks about it, he feels like he’s gonna have a heart attack. 

Tony can see the exhaustion pulling at the corners of Peter’s eyes, the tension in his temples, and Peter runs a hand through his hair. He rubs his eyes, and turns onto his back. 

Tony sighs. “Listen, I, uh—I know all this is like, beyond difficult, beyond insane, hard to deal with, plain and simple, but uh, it’d be super cool if you talked to me. I’d love that.” He hopes he doesn’t sound too harsh and he rubs his hand over the sling again. “I mean. If you—”

“I’m sorry I’m being annoying,” Peter mutters, and he covers his face with his hands.

“No, no,” Tony says, shaking his head. “Not annoying. At all. Ever.” He’s definitely called him annoying plenty of times, to his face, but that shit’s not allowed right now and he kinda wants to redact it all if it’d help any. “I just—I’m—a goddamn worrywart, as you well know, and I just want to—I wanna help, I don’t want you cooped up in here drowning in it—”

“I just—I don’t feel like—feel like me anymore,” Peter says, letting his hands slide away. He stares at Tony with a deep kind of sadness in his eyes and shifts up the bed, leaning against the pillows and looking off towards the door. “I don’t know, I wanna be happy, I am happy that I’m—that I’m alive, that I’m here but I just—I don’t feel at home in my own skin, I don’t know how to be—you know, in the world again? I’m afraid it’s gonna keep feeling like this. And thinking about you guys doing what you did, you—you—” He gestures to Tony’s arm and swallows hard. “I hate that—”

“Stop,” Tony says, scooting closer.

“—and Steve’s face,” Peter says, almost gasping now. “Rhodey almost—God, he almost—”

“Stop, stop, Pete,” Tony says, taking Peter’s forearm. “He didn’t almost anything, Steve’s fine, he’s rocking a badass new scar, and best of all, we’re alive, bud. You don’t have anything on your conscience so don’t play that, do not—even start on that, you don’t need that.”

Peter sighs, shaking his head.

“As for feeling like you…kid, I get it. I don’t feel like me. The whole time you were gone, I didn’t feel like me. That’s not something that fades by shutting yourself away, shit, the only time I feel like me is when I’m around you, Pep, the others—I know this feels easier, just to—be away, stew in it, but that’s not gonna fix anything. I’m not planning on inviting the press in here, I’m not planning on—sending you on a mission or some shit, I just want you to—sit out in the living room with us. So we can see you, you can try to—ease back into things. Nothing’s gonna happen fast, especially after what you’ve been through.”

Peter chews on his lower lip. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to worry you—”

“No sorry’s ever. Ever meaning forever.” He sighs, watching as Peter looks up at him. “You’re not gonna keep feeling like this. I’m not gonna let you keep feeling like this. Kay? Not happening. You can talk to me, you can talk to May, you can tell us anything. You can do this, you’re one of the strongest people I know. Even if you don’t feel like it right now.”

Peter laughs, and Tony isn’t sure if he hears any bitterness in it. “I’m not—”

“Nope, sorry, I’m the adult, I know best.” He sighs, wishes he was better at this shit, because he wants more than anything to make everything okay again. For everybody. “Hey, c’mere. I know I give shitty hugs with this thing but a shitty hug is better than no hug.” He closes the distance between them. The Peter Parker he knows loves hugs, and they haven’t hugged since the moment the kid reappeared. Like a hallucination, suddenly there, and Tony was half dead in that moment, half stuck in the past horror when Peter fell into his arms on Titan. But he didn’t disappear this time, only shook and grasped at him, quiet and confused. But he was solid. He didn’t disappear. Not this time. 

He doesn’t now, either, just turns his face into Tony’s good shoulder and sighs heavily. 

“If it makes you feel any better, Thor’s holing himself up, too,” Tony says, gripping the back of Peter’s neck. “I’ve gotta, like—get some kinda something to lure you all out.” He ruffles Peter’s hair. “What’d you miss most, huh? Uh, food wise. I mean, food solves everything. I can’t even tell you how many times a tuna sandwich has saved my life. Tuna sandwiches make me feel more like me, what do you, uh—think does that for you?”

Peter shakes his head against Tony’s shoulder. “Um. Cookie monster ice cream.”

Tony snorts. Peter introduced him to cookie monster ice cream, which was just a very bright blue ice cream that tasted like raspberry. It was good, not as good as the kid made it out to be but pretty good, but it made their teeth blue for the rest of the damn day. He pulls back a little bit, his hand on Peter’s shoulder, and Peter smiles crookedly, wiping at his eyes. “Okay,” Tony says. “I can swing that.”

~

About an hour later Tony has FRIDAY make an announcement in everybody’s rooms that he’s fallen and he can’t get up. In desperate need of assistance. 

“They’re gonna hate you,” Pepper says, smiling at him as she lays out the last bowl. “You just had to be dramatic.”

“I mean, it could have easily happened,” Tony says, putting down the third shaker of sprinkles and turning on the chocolate fountain. “I’m the one armed man.”

“Shut up. You know I hate that.”

“Sorry, sorry,” he says, leaning in and pressing a kiss to her cheek. She hums to herself and turns to press a lopsided kiss to his mouth, rubbing his free arm. He steps closer to her. “Hey, did you know? That you’re the most beautiful woman in the world? I just thought you should know that.”

“Sweet talker,” she says, kissing him again. 

Natasha and Clint race into the room and come to a halt when they see him standing there. Natasha’s hair is still in that messy bun that she’s been sporting since they settled here, and it’s wispy and sticking out all over, like she’d been lying down too. 

“Was he—did he fall?” Clint asks, looking at Pepper. He’s still limping, but Tony tries not to notice. Tiredness clings to his eyes too.

“Oh, no, he’s a liar,” Pepper says, before Tony can say anything.

“I told you,” Natasha says. “It felt like a Tony move.”

“But here!” Tony says, tugging on Pepper’s arm and pulling her to the side. “Look what—”

“Tony!” Thor yells, bounding around the corner. “Tony!”

“Thor, I think he’s—see look,” Bruce says, tugging on Thor’s elbow as they roll up behind Clint and Natasha. “See, he’s fine.”

Thor’s face is still bruised and battered, even with his advanced healing, and he looks around wildly. “But—the voice announced—”

“Oh my God, yes, I’m a liar,” Tony says. “I wanted to get you all out here—is everybody coming?”

“Yeah, I didn’t, uh—I didn’t think it was true,” Steve says, popping up with Bucky and Sam on his heels. Bucky is still hovering close to Steve, their arms bumping. “Ice cream?”

“Ice cream bar,” Tony clarifies. He wanted it to look nice, so he put all nine of the different flavors into big serving bowls with their own scoopers, and then he laid out all kinds of shit for toppings—cherries, whipped cream, peanuts, fizzy pops, coconut shreds, m&m’s, strawberries, salted caramel, the goddamn works. The store tried to give it to him for free because of the whole saving the world thing, but he wasn’t having that. “Help yourselves—but go easy on the blue one, that’s uh—”

“For Peter,” Steve says, smiling knowingly at him. 

“Where’s everybody else?” Tony asks, clearing his throat as everybody moves past him and over to the table. “I can see Rocket going ham on this shit.”

“Guardians were up on the roof, I don’t know if they heard the announcement,” Sam says, and he’s still moving gingerly, like he’s afraid he might fall apart if he doesn’t. “Is that mint chocolate chip? I hope that’s mint chocolate chip.”

“Yes, I thought of you,” Tony says, watching as they grab their bowls, talking amongst themselves as they start to pick and choose.

“Found these two in the hallway,” Rhodey’s voice says. Tony turns to see him alongside Peter and May. “You’re lucky I’m in a lovey dovey mood or I’d kick your ass, Tones. Goddamn stupid announcement.”

“I love your lovey dovey moods,” Tony says, beaming at him as Rhodey knocks into him slightly when he goes by. He’s still got the big bandage on the side of his throat, and Tony looks forward to the day when he doesn’t see it there anymore.

“Peter warned me,” May says, shaking her head at him. 

“Yeah, I didn’t wanna freak him out so I told him ahead of time,” Tony says, walking up to them. He goes to clench his bad hand but he stops himself, because he’s gotta stop exacerbating it, he’s gotta let it get better. 

“You got cookie monster?” Peter asks, smiling up at him. 

“Duh,” Tony says. “And those fizzy pop things you like.” He pats Peter’s shoulder, grinning. “Go dig in, underoos, go make the best damn sundae we ever did see.”

“Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Peter says, looking brighter than Tony’s seen him since they all came back to Earth. It’s a start.

“You’re welcome, Mr. Parker.”

Peter shuffles past, is quickly welcomed into the crowd, and May slides in close to Tony’s side. 

“I think your talk might have motivated him a little bit,” she says. “The ice cream was a good idea.”

Tony tilts his head to the side. “Well, I’m good at buying people shit, so I figured I could combine that power with bringing everybody together. Ice cream and family, you know—I thought that might be a good mix. And he mentioned it, so. Felt right.”

“Thank you,” she says, in a rush of breath. “Thank you for having us, thank you for—for trying, thank you for—for him, for bringing him back.”

_I couldn’t not. I had to. There wasn’t any other option._ “Don’t thank me,” he says, looking at her. “It’ll be a long road, but I think—we’ve got this.”

A portal opens behind them and makes them both jump. They turn and see Strange standing there, his brows furrowed as the portal closes with a couple flashes and pops. 

“You’re not on the ground,” he says. 

“No, I’m on my feet,” Tony says. “C’mon, let’s go and get ice cream.”

**Author's Note:**

> Little angsty fic with some fluff thrown in because who I am without my fluff?? I am trying my hardest to write a very long fic utilizing the Groundhog day trope and mainly focusing on Iron Dad, but I can't seem to break my habit of wanting to post things regularly LOL. It's gonna be a long journey (probably upwards of 20k? Probably definitely) with the Iron Fam (minus Pepper but you'll find out the reason for that when/if I ever get this damn thing posted, but don't worry she's alive and well). So if that sounds good to you let me know, because hearing your interest will be some good motivation to get going on it!! I still have a few holidays planned and the Daredevil followup and a bunch of other things too!


End file.
